For more than a century, Einstein’s theory of general relativity has been the key to understanding gravity. But new research suggests this theory is “gliding” into the furthest reaches of space. That doesn’t mean we throw Einstein’s theory out the window. But it might need a little adjustment. Over the past hundred years, countless studies … Read more
The remaining light from the early universe has a major flaw, and we don’t know how to fix it. It’s the cold spot. It’s just way too big and way too cold. Astronomers aren’t sure what it is, but largely agree it’s worth investigating. The cosmic microwave background (CMB) was created when our universe was … Read more
American astrophysicist and Nobel laureate Arno Penzias, who has died aged 90, was responsible for one of the greatest cosmological revelations of the 20th century: the discovery of the cosmic microwave background, the leftover radiation from the Big Bang. He first demonstrated its existence in 1965 with his collaborator Robert Wilson, and five years later—along … Read more
Astronomers have used the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and predicted an effect by Albert Einstein more than 100 years ago to discover that small galaxies packed a huge punch in the early cosmos, forming the entire universe when it was less than 1 billion years old. The international team found that the galaxies, which … Read more
Astronomers have discovered an unexpected and unexplained phenomenon outside our Milky Way Galaxy that emits high-energy light called gamma rays. The team behind the discovery, including NASA and cosmologist Alexander Kashlinsky of the University of Maryland, found the gamma-ray signal while sifting through 13 years of data from NASA’s Fermi telescope. “It is a completely … Read more
This article was originally published on The conversation. The publication contributed the article to Space.com Expert voices: opinion pieces and insights. Indranil Banik is a postdoctoral researcher in astrophysics at the University of St Andrews. One of the greatest mysteries in cosmology is the rate at which the universe is expanding. This can be predicted … Read more